Millions of people around the world will go hungry this holiday season while an innovative food aid program developed by the American Soybean Association (ASA) is tied up in the bureaucracy of interagency budgeting. U.S. soybean farmers, who harvested a bountiful soybean crop at near record production levels this year, are anxiously awaiting a decision by the Federal Office of Management and Budget (OMB) that could provide high protein soy products to food-deficit countries around the world.

"The American Soybean Association had high hopes that U.S. soybean products could have provided relief to hundreds of thousands of children and adults this year through a $1 billion food assistance program that ASA presented to USDA Secretary Dan Glickman nine months ago," said ASA First Vice President Tony Anderson, a soybean producer from Mount Sterling, Ohio. "As we approach the holiday season, it’s most unfortunate that OMB is delaying a program that USDA has recommended."

Humanitarian assistance groups are also calling for rapid OMB approval of the request. These private voluntary organizations (PVOs) have developed proposals on how they could effectively use U.S. soybeans and soy products in their feeding programs in developing countries.

Executive Director of the Coalition for Food Aid Ellen Levinson said, "The way that the private voluntary organizations look at this initiative is a very positive way to marry the expertise of the American Soybean Association and its affiliates with the capabilities that PVOs have in a hundred-plus countries around the world that are food-deficit."

Levinson said that these food-deficit countries are the primary target countries for much of the soybean initiative because they cannot afford to buy enough food to meet their needs. Other target countries include the former Soviet Republics and some Latin American countries, which still have pockets of poverty that greatly need assistance.

The PVOs represented by the Coalition for Food Aid include some religious groups, such as Catholic Relief Services, the Adventist Development and Relief Agency, and World Vision, and other charitable and developmental organizations, such as C.A.R.E., Save the Children, and Afri-Care.

ASA developed the initiative in cooperation with the National Oilseed Processors Association (NOPA), the industry group that processes soybeans into a variety of food and feed products, to identify markets where the various products could be used without displacing U.S. commercial sales. Soybean farmers hope the food aid initiative will assist the most needy countries in the world with much needed food aid while helping to improve prices paid to farmers for their soybeans. The program will also help develop new markets for U.S. agricultural products by introducing soy to areas of the world that currently cannot afford to purchase them.

The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) says it is holding up the government response to ASA’s proposal because of concerns about the donation’s impact on the federal budget. However, ASA believes that Secretary Glickman has discretionary authority to utilize Commodity Credit Corporation (CCC) funds for the program and views OMB’s delay as unnecessary.

Anderson said, "When ASA met with Secretary Glickman in March, the Association presented a 21-page detailed list of prospective markets that included about 3.7 million tons of soy products worth approximately $1 billion. Since that time, ASA has continued to develop the program by identifying opportunities to make the plan workable for USDA. Now we are urging OMB to place a high priority on getting the budget for the soy food aid approved so that USDA can implement the program."

Levinson said. "I see a lot of positive outcome. Having worked on this for many years, I really appreciate that ASA has the foresight to get a lot of commodities overseas and to try to target this assistance in a way that will have long term market development and human growth benefits."